Fracture
by resile
Summary: Ten/Rose mental illness AU.


**Note:** **This story was inspired by this recent story by deathlywritings.** She did a lovely job writing a sweet story and dealt with her prompt with sensitivity. I have been meaning to write this oneshot for a long time and it brought it back to mind. To be really clear here, this story is deeply personal to me. Almost all of it comes directly from my own experience dealing with my mother, who has schizoaffective disorder. deathlywritingswas gracious enough to let me post this soon after she wrote on a similar theme and I really appreciate that.  
**Warning: This story deals with mental illness in great detail, specifically from the point of view of the ill person's loved one. The specific diagnosis in the story is schizoaffective disorder.**

**Beta: Rointheta**

* * *

There was a time when it was easy. When they'd gone for chips, had picnics in the grass, and laughed together. Rose knew, right from the start, that he'd been through a lot. Something traumatic. A terrible family history, at least. He didn't talk about it much and he had no family to speak of anymore. There was something, right from the beginning, that cast a shadow behind his eyes, turned moments of laughter into seriousness, or moments of seriousness into near-hysteria. Something fragile.

Before, they'd been skirting around something. They hadn't been _there_ yet. Whatever it was, wasn't adequately summed up by 'boyfriend.' (It was better than that, she'd always said, even if they had never made it past friends, technically speaking.) But they had been happy. There'd been laughter and sunshine and they'd talked about being in each other's lives forever, even if they hadn't got there yet, were barely on their way.

No matter how badly it hurt now she kept those moments close. Reminded herself that there was a reason she was still fighting for him.

She wasn't there when he decompensated the first time. He was on a rescue mission. He was a doctor. _The_ Doctor, really, and that day he was called in to respond to a water-borne illness that was spreading quickly through a remote military base in Alaska. He'd been called in to take samples, work through a treatment, and Rose had been terrified he'd contract the disease himself. He'd placated her fears, assured her he'd be fine, but was suspiciously insistent she stay behind.

In the end, he couldn't save them all, had apparently grown fierce and frightening in his single-minded pursuit of a treatment.

Then, when he had administered his first successful treatment to Captain Adelaide Brooke, he'd called Rose, and had sounded different. He was always energetic, but this was the first time she'd heard him sound manic. The words came fast, scrambled. At first, she'd laughed, telling him to slow down, congratulating him. Telling him she knew he was going to figure out the treatment. But his voice had been supercharged. He couldn't calm down. His excitement stretched from the treatment to other topics, to rambling and ranting about her joining him in Alaska, leaving London behind, hitchhiking their way to New York City. She'd hung up with a cold sort of feeling in her chest, wondering idly if the stress was becoming too much for him.

And when Captain Adelaide Brooke, devastated about the loss of her team, had shot herself that same day, he'd lost it altogether. Torn at his hair, screamed, scratched at himself, until someone subdued him. She'd heard all this later, in bits and pieces, from his colleagues, from him, from a doctor.

The next thing Rose had heard, he was in a mental health unit at a hospital in Fairbanks. They'd kept him under treatment for 72 hours, the maximum allowed before a court hearing out in Alaska. She'd made her way there in time to support him through the hearing. She wasn't allowed to give testimony, but he'd spoken. He'd been calm, nearly sedate. He'd explained he was a doctor, and that the stress of practice had been too much that day. Otherwise, he was all right. Ready to go home to London.

A week after that, it happened again. This time, there was no big catalyst. Just a snap of the fingers, and all that logic, all that careful deliberation that made up the man she knew, was gone.

This time, with her support, he'd voluntarily committed himself for treatment, and he'd been under inpatient care for a week. After, he'd been put on a new medication regimen that marked the hours passing in the day: morning, noon, evening, and night. And for a while, a month or two, it was fine. He was subdued, but sweet. Until he wasn't. Until he disappeared for two days, and police officers found him wandering through the tunnels underneath the Thames. He told them he was there to clear out all the spiders.

She wondered sometimes if living together would've made him any better, or if she'd've got hurt putting herself in the way of his reckless behavior. Maybe if they'd lived together, he wouldn't have missed his meds. But then, he couldn't quite say whether he _had_ missed them. Maybe they weren't working quite right in the first place.

Either way, it kept happening. On her end, she didn't hear from him for a week. Called and called, and he wouldn't answer his mobile. She'd gone to the police, but they said she'd need to wait longer before she filed a missing persons report. By the time that week had passed, he'd finally called her from an inpatient behavioural health unit in London.

The next time, he was out for two weeks before he went back again.

The time after that, three days.

They started throwing around diagnoses: schizoaffective disorder, or maybe schizophrenia. These things could, apparently, be hard to tell sometimes.

"I don't think I have schizophrenia," he said one night. "I think I've got bipolar disorder. It's my _mood_, Rose." He dragged out the 'oo.' "Not like I'm delusional or anything."

"I dunno," Rose said. She was saying that a lot. She never knew what to say anymore.

She tried to learn. Spent hours googling the differences between them all. Then, she went out and bought a copy of the DSM-IV. Schizoaffective seemed to combine the symptoms of bipolar and schizophrenia. But bipolar on its own could also involve delusions and paranoia. And schizophrenia could involve mood fluctuations. In the end, it didn't really clear much up.

When they were together in person, it was usually better. He looked at her with bright eyes, always so happy to see her. They did simple things. In the hospital, she'd sit with him in the visitor's room, and he'd tell her about the friends he made, the group therapy sessions. He was always so optimistic that he'd be home soon, that he'd be discharged and back to work and that would be that.

Out of the hospital, she took him to the shops for new socks and pants, since he kept losing them. She couldn't afford to get him a new suit, so she got him t-shirts and trousers. He was always losing his clothes.

She took him to lunch in a restaurant. A movie. Short visits, two or three hours at most.

He spent a lot of time asking her questions about work, about her family.

_Was everyone doing all right? Pete? Jackie? Tony? _

_What did you do at work today? Yesterday? _

_What did you eat for dinner last night?_

On bad days, real answers, long answers, didn't generate more conversation. It was like he couldn't quite concentrate on her words and soon he was just smiling as she spoke.

_Like a child_, she thought traitorously.

It was after that she stopped thinking of him as the love of her life. She wasn't sure what he was now. Not quite a friend, certainly not a would-be lover. She loved him still. Always would, she reckoned. But he was hardly the same man.

It hurt, now. It only ever hurt.

"I think," he whispered into the phone one afternoon by way of greeting, "the doctors here are aliens."

"What?" Rose swallowed, rubbing her eyes, and sat down at her dining table.

"They're stealing the ventilator machines. They're going to use them to get back to their home planet."

"I don't think they'd-"

"As soon as I leave here, I'm going right to the police. Straighten this right up! I was going to be a police officer, you know. They said I couldn't join because I had two hearts."

"Um-"

"But I've always been a police officer. I stop the bad guys. More like a detective, you might say. Or a superhero. Did I tell you about the time I was on the cover of Time magazine? Time Lord, they called me. But they got my hair all wrong. Oh! Dinner's here. The food here is _great_. We're having salisbury steak tonight. I'll call you later. Bye, Rose!"

He hung up without waiting for a response.

It wasn't long after that, that he stopped paying his mobile bill. She got him a new one, one of those non-contract mobiles, but he lost it right away. Then, he stopped paying his rent. A month after that, his case worker got him access to a group home, after he was evicted.

Rose had thought about taking him in, that guilt nagging at her in the pit of her stomach, but he was always _wandering_. Leaving at all hours, bringing home strays. Seemed to think he was saving the world, half the time. How could she possibly live with him like that? Maybe, when he was back on his feet. When they found a medication that worked.

Once he was in his group home, there was hardly any communication between his hospital stays, apart from calls from stranger's mobiles. His new companions, he said. An ever-changing cast of friends. If she called the main telephone line of the group home, it would ring and ring. She couldn't reach him and when she stopped over there one day, the patients knew exactly who _the Doctor_ was, but all they said was he was out, exploring time and space.

"My new roommate is great," he told her one night, from his roommate's mobile. "We both like listening to Elvis, and he has a radio. Handy, that!"

"That's great," she said.

"Did I ever tell you about the time I met Elvis?" he asked, and she pressed her hand over the mouthpiece of the phone. Let out a sigh. Oblivious, he chattered in her ear.

She'd been on some websites about dealing with loved ones with mental illness. They said not to correct your loved one on their delusions. Nothing could snap them out of it. It wasn't worth the energy. Could damage their good feelings towards you. Just let them talk. So she did.

He talked for half an hour that night. It was unbelievably lonely.

The next night, he called complaining that his roommate was stealing his things. He probably was. Rose started putting together another care package. Pants, socks, t-shirts, shorts, soap, toothpaste, deodorant. No razors.

The night after that, he called and told Rose his roommate was an alien.

The night after that, he was back in hospital.

Months went by. The roommates changed. The group home changed, too. Always a new placement, a new medication. Nothing helped. She kept going, kept talking to him every day on the phone, visiting once a week. Sometimes it felt like the illness was taking over her life, too.

She was visiting in person, seated in the barren visitation room. Instead of chairs, this room had a sort of bench along two walls, facing one another. The benches were padded, more like couches than anything. It made sitting next to someone extremely irritating. Seated across from each other, they were much too far away. Seated next to each other, they had to twist. It got uncomfortable, and with an hour to fill in the empty room, it was nearly all Rose could focus on. Still, it was clean.

They were talking about electroconvulsive therapy.

"No one's really sure why it works," he said. "But sometimes it does. Particularly for people with affective disorders."

"Right," she said, looking down at her feet and crossing her legs at the ankle. It sounded like something out of a movie. Something awful.

"I'm tired of this," he said, and she saw a glimmer of the man she'd known. "I want to live on my own again. I want to work."

"Do you want to try it?" She bit her lip. Today was better than usual. His mood was level. He could hold a conversation. Maybe he didn't need something so extreme.

"Yeah. Think I do. I just - Need to get stable. None of these medications are working."

"Hello?" she said, recognising the main number of the hospital on her mobile and settling back into her sofa.

"Rose!" He sounded delighted. "I found you!"

"Hi?" She wasn't sure what to say to that.

"I couldn't remember your phone number. But then I started playing around with numbers and I got you!"

"Oh," Rose said. "Sorry?"

"Weren't you worried about me?"

Generally, yes, but they had spoken two days ago. "I don't know. A little?"

"A little? We haven't spoken in, what, a month? I thought I lost you forever!"

"No," she corrected, "It's only been two days."

"Oh, two days. Is that's all? Okay." He didn't seem overly concerned about the disparity. "Time is relative, I suppose."

"How are you?" she asked.

"I should be leaving tomorrow!"

"Do you need me to pick you up?"

"Naah." He sounded really happy, that tinge in his voice bordering on mania, and something dropped like lead in her gut. "We can go get some dinner this weekend, how about that?"

"Yeah. Sure." The thought of him discharged, but unable to remember her phone number nagged at her. "Why don't you write down my phone number?"

"All right. Hold on!" She heard the thud of the phone being put down and then shuffling. A few minutes later he was back. She gave him her number. His doctor's number. Made him promise to call when he got home.

He didn't.

The police found him wandering the night after he was discharged, and he called her from hospital again two days later.

He called her almost every day. His number was always changing - hospital to group home to mobiles of his friends. And he called enough - too much, really - so she really never called him. Not anymore.

Sometimes he called ten times a day.

Sometimes he didn't call at all.

She'd always have that grace period, where she was relieved not to hear from him. A day or two or three. A respite. She could push him out of her mind, spend time with her mum and dad and Mickey. Feel like her old self, a bit.

Then, when it was four or five days without a call, a week, two weeks, the guilt would pile up again. Was he all right? Where was he? She'd call the hospital. The group home. Sometimes she'd find him, and he'd be cheery and oblivious, as though they'd spoken the day before.

Once, the hospital had told her he'd been discharged, and the group home had said he'd never come back. She didn't hear from him for over two weeks, and feared the worst.

When he finally called, it was after midnight. Rose raced to the phone, picked it up, her heart pounding.

"Hello!" he said brightly. Her eyes filled with tears, relief spreading through her.

"Where have you _been_?" she asked. "I couldn't reach you!"

"I hit my head," he said.

"You hit your- Are you all right?"

"Yep!"

"Where are you?"

"Dunno. Some hospital up north. I don't think anyone here speaks English. Can't understand a word they're saying."

"Why didn't you call?"

"I couldn't remember your number."

She vowed not to go more than three days without speaking to him from now on. He could've died. Could've been dead and she wouldn't've known.

Years later, she sometimes wondered why she still kept their relationship going.

He needed her, and she still loved him, even if there was something heavy and aching in that love now. She was beyond hope that he'd ever be back to normal. Years of psychotropic medication were slowly wearing him down. He wasn't so sharp, now. Wasn't so present. He had more bad days than good. And every day, whether it was a phone call, or a voicemail, or a visit in person, he was in her life, cycling through periods of mania, delusions, and tentative stability that were too easily snuffed. He'd been through long-term voluntary commitments, institutionalisation, and more group homes than she could count. It couldn't end well. The man she'd wanted to build her life with was gone. And sometimes she wondered why she still cared.

It was simple, in the end. She was the only family he had.


End file.
